The Breakfast Club (Instrumental Innovations)

People who are not really familiar with Art Music (and even some who are) have a tendency to think that modern orchestral instrumentation sprang fully formed from the head of Zeus like Athena.  The truth is that composers often look for novel sounds and instruments and players instruments that are easier to play.

Consider the valved Brass instruments I’m most familiar with.  Until the late 18th, early 19th century there was no such thing.  Instead you were limited to major harmonics controlled by your embouchure (basically the tightness of your lips and facial muscles).  Sure you could flatten or sharp it a little, but if you wanted to play in a different key, you had to use a different instrument.

Even an unvalved French Horn (the oldest of the modern brass instruments) was invented as recently as 1725.

During the Baroque and Classical periods instrumentation changed quite a bit, so much so that there is now an Early Music movement dedicated to Renaissance and Medieval instruments and performance styles.  Concert strings switched from fretted to unfretted (which makes certain obvious and non-obvious changes to the harmonics that are too difficult to get into here).  Flat backs were replaced by shaped ones that sound louder.  Lutes are replaced by guitars.

The Woodwind instruments (flute, clarinet, oboe, bassoon) owe their modern shape to Theobald Boehm who in 1847 introduced a simplified (Hah!  Too many for me.) fingering system that used a complicated set of levers and pads to control the airflow, and thus the harmonics.

You may be somewhat aware of the development of the Pianoforte (means Soft/Loud) from the earlier Harpsichord by replacing a plucked string system with a percussive hammer action.  Well, that happened in 1700, 400 years ago but not, you know, in the dim dark mists of some pre-historic time.  New York City had over 7,000 inhabitants and was to publish it’s very first newspaper in a mere 25 years (same time as the French Horn).

The Saxophone, the newest of what is generally considered a “classic” orchestra instrument was patented in 1840 by Adolphe Sax.  The Tuba in 1835.

So what occasions this discussion of the history of musical instruments?  The 81st birthday of Robert Moog.

There is an unfortunate prejudice against electronic instruments in Art Music.  Because they are programmable (with the right kind of controls) they are derided as mere recordings and, because they can replace many imperfect musicians with one that always does what you tell it to (which may not be what you want), are rightly viewed as an employment threat.

In their earliest forms though a considerable amount of skill and practice was required, just as with any instrument.  One of the first electronic instruments was the Theremin.  It was patented by Léon Theremin in 1928.  You don’t physically touch the instrument, it senses the capacitance between your hands and the sensors to control pitch and volume.  While it did gain some novelty attraction in Art Music world it is best known for lending its 87 year old “futuristic” sound to movie sound tracks and TV theme songs.

Recognize that?  It’s the Dr. Who theme commonly credited to the BBC Radiophonic Workshop that was really composed by Ron Grainer and performed by Delia Derbyshire.

Robert Moog built one himself and later put together a fairly popular (among electronics geeks) kit.

A really popular electronic instrument is the Hammond electric organ from 1935.  It was intended as a low cost, lighter, semi-portable alternative to a traditional pipe organ and quickly saturated the ecclesiastical market.  The sound is produced “by creating an electric current from rotating a metal tonewheel near an electromagnetic pickup.”  While it has many buttons and sliders that can produce different sounds none of them actually sound like an organ and the greatest similarity is the stop switches and keyboard controls.

What Moog did that was different with his synthesizer is that he didn’t try to duplicate anything.  I had an opportunity to work with an early model and it was basically a wave form generator patched through an amplifier.

There are 3 basic types, Sine, Square, and Sawtooth, so named because that’s what they look like on an oscilloscope which is your main output device (other than your speakers).  You can control amplitude and frequency and (in the case of Sawtooth) rate of attack and decline.  Using these fundamental tools it is theoretically possible to reproduce any sound at all.

Theoretically.  Most of my efforts sounded like that annoying hum you get when you haven’t plugged your components together properly, but I am decidedly unmusical and only had a couple of hours to play with it.

Modern practice is to sample the sound you want to duplicate, analyze it to its components, and tweak the output until it sounds the way you like.  Computer generated sound is capable of things human musicians can not duplicate any more than John Henry, on the other hand you still have to imagine it and tell them what to do.  60 Hz AC is perfectly acceptable noise, but it’s hardly a symphony.

Obligatories, News and Blogs below.

Obligatories

Welcome to The Breakfast Club! We’re a disorganized group of rebel lefties who hang out and chat if and when we’re not too hungover we’ve been bailed out we’re not too exhausted from last night’s (CENSORED) the caffeine kicks in. Join us every weekday morning at 9am (ET) and weekend morning at 10:30am (ET) to talk about current news and our boring lives and to make fun of LaEscapee! If we are ever running late, it’s PhilJD’s fault.

I would never make fun of LaEscapee or blame PhilJD.  And I am highly organized.

The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars, but in ourselves, that we are underlings.

–Julius Caesar (I, ii, 140-141)

This Day in History

News

Senate Blocks Bill on N.S.A. Collection of Phone Records

By JENNIFER STEINHAUER

MAY 23, 2015

The Senate will reconvene on May 31 to try again. But any extension is far from certain to get approval from the House, which is in recess until June 1, with at least one member threatening to block it.

“Any extension is going to be problematic in the House,” said Representative Adam B. Schiff of California, the ranking Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee. Mr. Schiff noted that many of the votes against the measure in the House were by members who didn’t think it went far enough. The matter is likely to come up after the one-week recess.

Under the bipartisan House bill, which passed 338 to 88 last week, the Patriot Act would be changed to prohibit bulk collection by the National Security Agency of metadata charting telephone calls made by Americans.

However, while the House version of the bill would take the government out of the collection business, it would not deny it access to the information.

The measure failed in the Senate 57 to 42, with 12 Republicans voting for it, shortly after midnight because Mr. Paul, a candidate for the White House, dragged the procedure out as he promised to do in fund-raising tweets and emails.

USA Freedom Act fails as senators reject bill to scrap NSA bulk collection

by Ben Jacobs, Sabrina Siddiqui, and Spencer Ackerman, The Guardian

Saturday 23 May 2015 00.46 EDT

The bill was a compromise to limit the scope of government surveillance. It traded the end of NSA bulk surveillance for the retention through 2019 of Section 215, which permits the collection of “business records” outside normal warrant and subpoena channels – as well as a massive amount of US communications metadata, according to a justice department report.

Although the bill passed the House of Representatives by a massive 338-88 margin last week, it was unable to overcome concerns from Republicans about the process of letting telecom companies take responsibility about the collection data from the NSA.

…

When reporters asked Paul on Saturday morning whether he was concerned about the provisions of the Patriot Act expiring at the end of the month, the Kentucky Republican seemed unworried “We were liking the constitution for about 200 years and I think we could rely on the constitution.”

Obama Takes Unexpected Setback On Trade Agenda As Fast Track Passes Senate

Zach Carter, Ryan Grim, and Laura Barron-Lopez, Huffington Post

The Senate approved a bill to “fast-track” trade agreements negotiated by the president. The agreement will prevent Congress from amending or filibustering Obama’s controversial Trans-Pacific Partnership agreement. The TPP deal would have a hard time surviving without fast-track authority.

But a key crackdown on human trafficking survived the legislative jujitsu. The White House considers the provision a deal-breaker, as it would force one of the nations involved in the TPP talks — Malaysia — out of the agreement. An immigration-related amendment authored by Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) never got a vote, making it far more difficult for Obama to win over skeptical tea party Republicans in the House.

The slavery provision’s survival means that the House will either need to amend the bill and send it back to the Senate, which would cause a delay and complicate the House debate, or pass a bill and go to conference with the Senate, also causing a delay. It also potentially could be fixed in separate legislation otherwise moving through Congress.

But time is not on the side of advocates of the trade agenda, as summer recess is approaching, followed by a heated presidential campaign season. “It leaves a substantial problem that no one’s sure how will be addressed,” said one senator. If fast-track is ultimately approved, 60 days would need to pass before the TPP could be voted on.

…

“It’s an interesting thing, isn’t it, about Menendez — it didn’t get fixed,” Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio), a staunch opponent of the trade bill, said Friday night after the final vote.

“So it means, if nothing changes, Malaysia should not be in this agreement,” Brown said. “And if the president relaxes or un-designates Malaysia as a tier 3 designation, it would be a tragedy. So either Congress changes it or the House changes it.” Tier 3 is the lowest possible ranking in an annual report the U.S. issues gauging a country’s actions against human trafficking.

…

The administration could eliminate the procedural hurdle by simply upgrading Malaysia’s formal status on human trafficking, but doing so would undermine the integrity of a key U.S. human rights initiative designed to shame rogue regimes.

Secret Bank of England taskforce investigates financial fallout of Brexit

by Phillip Inman, The Guardian

Friday 22 May 2015 14.11 EDT

The Bank blew its cover on Friday when it accidentally emailed details of the project – including how the bank intended to fend off any inquiries about its work – direct to the Guardian.

According to the confidential email, the press and most staff in Threadneedle Street must be kept in the dark about the work underway, which has been dubbed Project Bookend.

It spells out that if anyone asks about the project, the taskforce must say the investigation has nothing to do with the referendum, saying only that staff are involved in examining “a broad range of European economic issues” that concern the Bank.

…

MPs are now likely to ask whether the Bank intended to inform parliament that a major review of Britain’s prospects outside the EU was being undertaken by the institution that acts as the UK’s main financial regulator. Carney is also likely to come under pressure within the Bank to reveal whether there are other undercover projects underway.

Officials are likely to have kept the project under wraps to avoid entering the highly charged debate around the EU referendum, which has jumped to the top of the political agenda since the Conservatives secured an overall majority. Many business leaders and pro-EU campaigners have warned that “Brexit” would hit British exports and damage the standing of the City of London.

5Ireland backs gay marriage in historic vote, ministers say

By Padraic Halpin and Conor Humphries, Reuters

Sat May 23, 2015 5:34am EDT

State broadcaster RTE said the victory appeared to be overwhelming and government minister Kevin Humphreys predicted the margin would be two-to-one.

“I think it’s won,” Equality Minister Aodhan O’Riordain told Reuters at the main count center in Dublin. “The numbers of people who turned out to vote is unprecedented. This has really touched a nerve in Ireland today.”

Gay marriage is backed by all political parties, championed by big employers and endorsed by celebrities, all hoping it will mark a transformation in a country that was long regarded as one of the most socially conservative in Western Europe.

Canadian three-way split might enable Harper to pull a Cameron in election

John Barber, The Guardian

Friday 22 May 2015 14.43 EDT

The Conservatives gained fresh hope of a sort this week with the release of polls showing a strong surge in support for the leftwing New Democratic party following its surprise victory in a recent provincial election in Alberta, a staunchly conservative region often called the Texas of Canada.

The NDP gains have drawn the federal party tied with the Conservatives and the Liberal party in voter approval ratings as the long campaign begins, thus improving the odds that the increasingly restive majority of Canadians who oppose the Harper government will once again divide their votes and usher him to victory.

…

Barlow accuses the Conservatives of hollowing out Canadian civil society, cancelling thousands of programmes, rescinding grants, removing regulations, shutting institutions and rescinding the tax-exempt status of annoying charities. “They don’t care about us and I don’t believe they try to represent us,” she says. “They only care about the 35% of the population they want to vote for them.”

Even former supporters have joined the attack. The government’s sweeping anti-terror legislation, seen as a political masterstroke when introduced, ultimately inspired a massive outcry that echoed from every establishment pulpit in the country. The government’s more recent attempt to announce clearly unattainable carbon-emission targets – and its subsequent U-turn inspired derision on both the right and left.

California accepts historic offer by farmers to cut water usage by 25%

by Rory Carroll, The Guardian

Friday 22 May 2015 16.27 EDT

By promising to forfeit a quarter of this season’s water – by fallowing land or finding other measures to cut usage – they have averted harsher restrictions from state authorities.

The State Water Board had warned it was days away from ordering some of the first cuts in more than 30 years to senior water rights holders.

“This proposal helps delta growers manage the risk of potentially deeper curtailment, while ensuring significant water conservation efforts in this fourth year of drought,” State Water Board chair Felicia Marcus said in a statement.

“It allows participating growers to share in the sacrifice that people throughout the state are facing because of the severe drought, while protecting their economic well-being by giving them some certainty regarding exercise of the State Water Board’s enforcement discretion at the beginning of the planting season.”

General Motors faces huge fine over ‘criminal’ ignition defects – reports

Reuters

Friday 22 May 2015 21.32 EDT

US justice department investigators have identified criminal wrongdoing in General Motors’ failure to disclose a defective ignition switch, and they are negotiating what is expected to be a record penalty.

…

The final number is still being negotiated but it is expected to exceed the $1.2bn paid last year by Toyota for concealing unintended acceleration problems, according to the newspaper.

The ignition switch issue has been linked to 84 deaths and 157 serious injuries.

Edward Snowden: NSA reform in the US is only the beginning

by Alan Rusbridger, Janine Gibson and Ewen MacAskill, The Guardian

Friday 22 May 2015 12.46 EDT

He also warned this was only the beginning of reform of the NSA, saying there are still many bulk collection programmes which are “even more intrusive”, but expressed hope that the Senate would act to curb the NSA, saying retention of the status quo is untenable.

In an hour-long interview with the Guardian in Moscow, the NSA whistleblower said the moves by the federal court and the House of Representatives marked the first time since the 1970s there had been a reduction rather than expansion in the powers of the surveillance agencies.

“In our modern era, that is without precedent,” he said.

“The idea that they can lock us out and there will be no change is no longer tenable. Everyone accepts these programmes were not effective, did not keep us safe and, even if they did, represent an unacceptable degradation of our rights.”

ISIS Presses Advance Near Iraqi City Of Ramadi

Reuters

05/22/2015 11:59 am EDT

The fall of Ramadi is the most significant setback for Iraqi forces in almost a year and has cast doubt on the effectiveness of U.S. strategy in helping Iraq to fight Islamic State.

While pro-government forces are seeking to retake the town, Islamic State fighters have been pushing forward in the direction of Fallujah in a bid to take more territory in Anbar province that would bring them closer to the Iraqi capital.

Amir al-Fahdawi, a leader of the pro-government Sunni tribal force in the area, said the militants were now around 5 km (3 miles) from the town of Khalidiya next to the Habbaniya military base where security forces and members of the Hashid Shaabi (Popular Mobilization) Shi’ite militia are massing.

“We are running short of arms and ammunition and we appealed yesterday for reinforcements. Zero additional troops plus zero ammunition back-up lead to zero morale for our fighters,” Fahdawi told Reuters.

“Today we retreated to Siddiqiya and I’m not sure if my fighters will hold up for much longer: they are tired and broken.”

Blogs

• The Big Banks Are Corrupt — and Getting Worse, by
  
  Richard (RJ) Eskow, Huffington Post
• When lapdogs rolled over for Bush: The mainstream media’s laughable Iraq hypocrisy, by Eric Boehlert, Salon
• Study: Lawmakers Assume Voters Are Way More Conservative Than They Are, By Susie Madrak, Crooks & Liars
• The next American revolution has already begun, by Raghav Sharma, Americablog
• DOJ IG Report Confirms Government Flouted Statutory Requirements of Section 215 for 7 Years, By emptywheel
• For 7 Years, FBI Defied Law for Seeking a Person’s Records Under Patriot Act, by Kevin Gosztola, Firedog Lake
• Wall Street Trading ‘Cartel’ Warned Initiates ‘Mess This Up And Sleep With One Eye Open’, by DSWright, Firedog Lake
• Good News on TPP, as Senate Passes Fast Track Bill with Human Trafficking Poison Pill, By Lambert Strether, Corrente
• France’s bold attack on food waste: Law will prohibit supermarkets from trashing unsold food, by Lindsay Abrams, Salon
• In the Same Week, the U.S. and U.K. Hide Their War Crimes by Invoking “National Security”, By Glenn Greenwald, The Intercept